by Josie Brown
Hell yeah, they are the Housewife Assassin.
“And right here, right now on this stage, you’ll see her in action—playing little old me.” Hearing the laughter rippling through the crowd, he shrugs modestly. “We’ll be wearing Rifts.” He points to the Jumbotron—“Right here on this screen, you’ll see what we see, and hear what we hear”—he pauses dramatically—“and when the loser dies, you’ll watch it happen too.”
His grand pronouncement is met with awed silence, followed by a thunderclap of applause.
I’m standing just offstage. But now that he throws out his right arm to include me, I steel myself with a deep breath, turn my frown upside down, and force myself to move forward until I’m side by side with him, arms raised in welcome, like some sort of magician’s assistant.
More like the ventriloquist’s dummy, seeing how I stiffen at the thought of what awaits me should I fail.
When he hands me the Rift headgear, the mob goes into a frenzy.
Before putting it on my head and over my eyes, I scan the audience for Jack. Finally, I find him, front and center. When our eyes meet, he blows me a kiss. Abu is there, too, standing over to one side, but close to the stage. He rewards me with a wink.
And then I see him, a few rows back from Abu—
Carl.
What the hell is he doing here?
He smiles at me.
Then he throws me a kiss and walks away.
What if he’s headed to the house?
Frantically, I seek out Jack again. When we see each other I shout, “Carl! Carl!” again and again, pointing in the direction I saw him last. But by the quizzical look on Jack’s face and the way he holds his hand to his ear, I realize he can’t make me out over the crowd, which is chanting, “Play! Play! Play!”
Roger puts his arm around my waist. “Let’s get this over with. I’ve got a reservation for the Mount Whitney suite at Disney’s Grand Californian, an Elsa costume—you know, from Frozen—and a flogger with your name on it. Walnut.”
He presumes too much.
I’m not into BDSM or cosplay.
And, if I were, I’d be Anna, not an Elsa.
As Virtual Donna, I awaken to the sound of the doorbell.
My God, he’s already here.
Not good. Here in Virtual Hilldale, the doorbell’s Big Ben chimes announce the arrival of guests bearing gifts: baskets of fruit, homemade cakes, pies, and cookies.
Poisoned, perhaps.
Today, there will only be one visitor, and whatever he carries will be lethal.
My guess is that he’s elected something more deadly than tainted fruit.
He wants a showstopper—something gory, since we’re live, life-size, in 3-D, and in front of an auditorium filled with rabid gamers.
The name of the game is to build up an arsenal made from things found around the typical household, and to do it as quickly as possible, so that you have the right weapon when the time comes to protect yourself. The weapons are worth five points apiece, all of which I will store in my deceivingly small Kate Spade clutch.
And believe me, the clock (in this case, the Tiffany oval cocktail watch which I wear on my slim virtual wrist; what can I say, I have great taste!) is always ticking.
I have only fifteen seconds before the game allows him to try the front doorknob. If my virtual children have followed house rules, they will have kept it locked, going and coming only through the back door, which takes them out into the yard, accessed only by a gate in the picket fence that goes around the perimeter of the property.
When Rifting, your slightest move is anticipated by your avatar. By shifting my body up, Virtual Me leaps out of bed—
To discover that all I’m wearing is a sheer pink negligee with nothing underneath. The laughter from the audience hits me like a cold wave.
I run over to my virtual closet. I know, I’m wasting time. But I’ll be damned if I’ll be playing this game with everyone ogling my ladybits!
I shove hanger after hanger to one side, but everything is eveningwear—too long and sexy for fighting. Next time, I’ll know better than to use the Saks catalog as my wardrobe wish list.
Emma whispers, “Donna on the opposite side of the closet, pull out the Daisy Dukes and the red-and-white plaid buttoned tie crop. Oh, and the stiletto heels that match!”
“Daisy Dukes? That’s the best you can do?”
She sighs. “If you remember, I didn’t have a heck of a lot of time to go through this month’s InStyle.”
The Daisy Dukes are too short—and too sweet, if the audience’s reaction is any indication. Thank goodness it is on Virtual Me as opposed to Real Me. No woman wants to see her cellulite on a Jumbotron, in 3D.
By the time I tie the cropped shirt, I’ve only got eleven seconds left!
I run to the kitchen, where I pocket a cleaver, a large fork, and food processor. Fifteen points!
“Don’t forget the fondue pot,” Emma whispers in my ear.
Interesting suggestion. Still, I’ll take her word and go with it. Besides, it brings my point count to twenty.
Next, I high-tail it out into the yard and into the gardening shed, where I grab a spade, a shovel, a pick, a chainsaw, and the lawnmower.
“Take the bug repellant too,” Emma insists.
“Gotcha,” I murmur, and sweep it into my purse. I’m now up to fifty points.
I’ve just stepped out into the yard when I see him, leaping over the gate—
Roger’s avatar.
I didn’t expect it to look like Roger. Even he must wince when he sees himself in the mirror. But the last thing I expected was for it to be the spitting image of Carl—tall, dark, and handsome, with broad shoulders and deep green eyes.
Shocked, I cry out, “What the hell?”
Hearing me, he looks in my direction and waves. “Honey, I’m home.”
Any doubts I may have had that Roger was in cahoots with Carl dissipate in the deep resonance of Carl’s voice.
“Damn it!” Emma shouts. “The fact that he’s your spouse automatically puts one hundred points on his side of the scoreboard!”
“But, in my profile, I put down ‘Jack’ as my husband!”
“Someone went in and changed it,” Emma insists.
It must have been Fu Manchu. Not only does he get back at me for bitch-slapping him, he scores major points with Roger for setting me up to be his sex slave.
“Worse yet, this version of the game has been re-coded as a shoot ’em up!” Emma warns me.
“What the heck does that mean?”
“In other words, it’s last man standing, take no prisoners, and no rezzing—resurrections—once you’ve been killed off.”
Over his dead body.
Make that Virtual Carl’s.
I’ll take care of Real Carl later.
Virtual Carl holds up his hands, as if to prove that there’s nothing in them.
I stay put. Let him come to me.
When he’s within kicking and throwing distance, I take the cleaver and hurl it. It twirls through the air like a tomahawk, headed directly at his chest.
He pulls a large magnet from his back pocket and holds it high over his head.
The cleaver flies to it, as if it found a long-lost pal.
The next thing I know, Virtual Carl has it pointed at my clutch purse. The magnet’s siren call has my metallic weapons flying to it.
Virtual Carl looks triumphant. He revs the chainsaw and holds it up to the crowd, so that they can see what he has planned for me next.
The audience is stunned—subdued. Will Housewife Assassin bite the virtual dust even before the game is launched?
“You’re not dead yet,” Emma promises me.
“He took everything in my arsenal!”
“No, not everything. Look in your clutch purse.”
She’s right. I’m left with the bug spray and the fondue pot. “Why didn’t they go to the magnet?” I ask.
“The bug spray is in a plastic canis
ter, and the fondue pot is ceramic.”
“Yep, okay.” I hold up what’s left of my weapons cache. “Hey look, Emma, I know chocolate-covered ants are considered a delicacy, but he’s not here for a dinner party.”
“Trust me on this. You’ll have a better chance if you run to the park and climb onto the slide,” Emma instructs me. “The fondue pot is always on. When he comes at you with the chainsaw, throw its contents at it. He won’t have time to react before you—”
“I’ll know what to do,” I assure her.
“Yes, I know,” she says matter-of-factly.
She has all the confidence in the world.
I wish I felt the same way.
Virtual Hilldale comes in CinemaScope. The sky is almost cobalt blue. The grass is thick. The roses are deep red and sweet pink. The leaves on the trees, which sway in a gentle breeze, gradate through a Pantone palette of green hues—from pale celadon to apple to lime to moss to hunter to shamrock to pine, and back again.
By the time I reach the park, sounds of the children assault my ears with happy squeals, sour tears, and salty declarations of revenge.
The chatter among the women meandering toward the park with their strollers is just as delicious. Tantalizing tidbits of gossip vie for the honor of the most delectable crumb of the day with scrumptious secrets, in which hearts are crossed as declarations of silence.
I wish I had time to stroll. Instead, I’m running for my virtual life.
I don’t know what my neighbors think of the man making his way down the street with a roaring chainsaw. Maybe the fact that he isn’t wearing a ski mask, but that he whistles and smiles and greets them each by name is his saving grace.
Talk about hiding in plain sight.
His chitchat puts them at ease. I wince every time he refers to me as his wife and asks if they’ve seen which way I’ve gone. Smart dude, since I could have hidden in any of the homes on either side of this cozy tree-lined lane.
You see, he’s trying to beat the clock too. Every ten seconds, another weapon disappears from his arsenal.
I’d certainly have a better chance if it came to hand-to-hand combat. Sadly, it will never come to that. Being good neighbors, they point him further toward the park.
I pray that my perch on the slide doesn’t make me a sitting duck.
As I climb up the steps of the slide to the top, the children part like a Biblical sea. In no time, they’ve disappeared, leaving Virtual Carl and me alone.
His grin is evil. “Are you coming down, or do I have to climb up to get you?”
“I like the view from here.”
He frowns. “You’re only making it harder on yourself.” He lowers his voice and whispers, “Walnut.”
“Promises, promises,” I taunt him.
He comes for me—not by way of the slide’s ladder, but up the curved tin slide, running fast and roaring loud.
I wait until he’s halfway up the slide before heaving the contents of the fondue pot at him.
A wave of hot oil—not hot chocolate—heads his way.
But, just at that moment, he shifts his hands so that it misses the chainsaw—
He doesn’t expect it to catch him in the face.
His howl echoes through the auditorium.
He bends forward, so that he doesn’t lose his balance on the slippery slide. This works in my favor. By the time he looks up, I’ve positioned the bug spray so that it is aimed right at his eyes.
All it takes is one long spritz of DEET and he’s shrieking in pain.
Now that he’s upright, I raise myself on the safety handles of the slide. With both legs, I kick him with all my might.
He topples backward, head over heels.
What goes up must come down. The momentum of Virtual Carl’s fall propelled the chainsaw into the air. It now comes spiraling down after him—
On top of him.
Limbs are severed and blood spews as the chainsaw twists and turns. Roger’s screams are chilling, prompting a horrified moan from the audience.
The tinkling chimes from my Tiffany watch announces that the game is over.
Virtual Donna grows until she covers the Jumbotron. Virtual Donna slaps her hands together with a smile and proclaims, “Another task completed! I think I’ll reward myself with a little shopping!”
By the time I take off my Rifts, the damage is done—not from some imaginary chainsaw, but from a mere misstep.
Roger took a twenty-foot drop, from the stage into the audience pit.
The fall killed him.
Or perhaps his very active imagination.
I shrug it off. At this point, all I care about is taking off my Rifts and getting out of this madhouse of cheering mayhem.
Jack leaps onto the stage and pulls me aside. “Donna, are you okay?”
“We have to get home—right now! Carl was here!”
He looks surprised. “No, you were seeing Roger’s avatar, that’s all—which certainly proves he was in cahoots with Carl—”
“You don’t get it!” I point out into the mob. “He was out there—in the flesh! And he made a point for me to see him. But then he left, just as the demonstration began!”
Jack frowns. “Perhaps Carl was here for one of the VIP game keys Roger was handing out.”
My eyes open wide. “But I never saw him approach the booth. Did you?”
Jack shakes his head. “That doesn’t mean anything. The last thing he would have wanted to do was give away his presence—until it was too late for us to do anything about it.” He taps his ear bud. “Abu, get to Roger’s body and lift any of the game keys that may still be in his possession. If he doesn’t have any, go to the booth and look for them there! If you find them, take them back to Acme for analysis.”
“I’m here now,” Abu promises. “And…got one.”
I grab Jack’s arm and drag him with me toward the stage door “Please, Jack, we have to go home now, before he gets to the children!”
He takes my hand, and together we run out the side stage door.
Jack was right. I should have told the children about Carl on that very first night we came home from DC.
Now, it’s too late. Carl gets to tell them his way.
All these years, he’s been the bad guy. Now it’s my turn.
Chapter 12
Heartbleed
In the cyberworld, “Heartbleed” is the aptly named security vulnerability found in OpenSSL encryption technology. It was only discovered in 2014, and considering that OpenSSL is used by roughly two-thirds of all web servers, Heartbleed is one of the most significant vulnerabilities discovered since the beginning of the Internet.
But heart bleed (the condition, if not the digital vulnerability) transcends the World Wide Web. For example, metaphorically speaking, a woman’s heart bleeds when she knows she’s hurt someone. If she loves the person, she will try to make amends—to put the pieces back together again, a frail endeavor indeed.
Needless to say, her heart bleeds too—again, metaphorically speaking—when it is broken.
Should the one who breaks her heart do so callously, despite the initial euphoria of posting his misdeeds on such man-bashing websites and apps such as LuLu, ReportYourEx, DontDateHimGirl, and WomanSavers, make your weapon something other than a computer keyboard.
Like say, a knife—strategically placed to the left of his breastbone, perhaps deep within the right ventricle of his heart.
No doubt his last thought will be, Payback’s a bitch.
Yes, he meant you.
In the lousy traffic from Anaheim, it takes us almost an hour to get home. I do my best to keep from breaking down in tears. Jack does his best not to drive off the road while I rant and rave over my stupidity for (a) talking myself—make that us—out of telling the children; (b) not planting a tracker on Carl, so that I know where he is at all times; or (c) not killing him when I had the chance.
“Look, there’s no way to change the past,” Jack reminds me. “The only thing w
e can do at this point is to move forward and work with what we have.”
I nod. “Good suggestion! Let’s do a full accounting.” I pull a folded stiletto from my bootie, my Sig from my thigh holster, and the MP5 hidden in a secret compartment under Jack’s dashboard. “I presume you’ve got, what, another three or four toys on you somewhere, am I right?”
He sighs. “I wasn’t suggesting all-out war—and not just because the neighbors are already skittish about our return to Hilldale. The last thing the children need right now is to see their mother do another perp walk for murdering a man they never knew was their father.”
“You’re right. We’re trying to set examples of graciousness for the kids.” So that they aren’t social pariahs, like their parents. In Hilldale’s social hierarchy, I’m on the lowest rung.
Granted, I’m still part of Penelope Bing’s carpool group, but only because the other moms are too smart to allow the inevitably carsick Cheever into their SUVs.
We careen into the driveway and Jack screeches to a halt. He’s right on my heels as I run to the front door.
The door is unlocked.
Slowly, I open it.
I don’t hear a sound.
Where are they?
More to the point, where is he?
Jack raises his hand to signal me to go through the dining room on the left. He then motions to indicate that he’ll circle around the living room and into the family room. He raises his palm vertically then points to the staircase, to indicate we’d go up together if Carl isn’t on the ground floor.
I nod, and inch my way through the dining room—
It’s empty.
I move toward the swinging door to the kitchen. Gently, I push it open—
It flies open, and I fall into Carl’s arms. Before I can stumble away, he tilts my head up so that my lips meet his—
But I fall onto my knees as he reels backward—
Against the cabinet, where Jack has slammed him, and put him into a choke hold.
